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MARK Wahlberg put it all on the line for his latest, “Shooter.” He ac tually went to sniper school in Las Vegas to prep for the role. Says Mark: “I went to Front Sight, which is the most elaborate weapon-training facility in the world. At one point, I was loaded down with 130 pounds of equipment and also carrying a huge sniper rifle while at the same time I’m walking out on a little thin beam a couple of hundred feet in the air.

“Listen, a few years ago I might have loved to do these things. But I’m getting a little older. I’m now a parent. And, hey, I have a little more to live for.”

THERE now exists a slight Hill & Bill kerfuffle.

Last week Operation Clinton scheduled a conference call. We are not talking your normal everyday garden-variety three- or four-person conference call. Approximately 200 souls were invited to hang on. The speakers were former President Bill and current Hillary treasurer Terry McAuliffe. Understand, organizing something so pervasive and massive takes heavy-duty planning, experts everywhere, foot soldiers everywhere and hundreds of faxes and e-mails and phone calls and text messages and probably drums on top of those native American casinos. This could not exactly be done under cover of darkness.

So, naturally, news leaked out. Some leakage went to Washington, D.C.’s newspaper The Hill, and reporters got in on the conference call. Didn’t announce themselves. Didn’t identify they were there. Just listened and heard and soaked up and wrote down. The result was a piece in their paper.

Clintonistas, leftists who are upstanding civil libertarians and fight for the rights, etc., etc., were enraged. Ever since it’s been Search ‘n’ Seizure Time. It’s lock the perpetrators in Guantanamo. It’s bind their hands with shredded pieces of the Patriot Act. It’s scorched earth policy until they find who told.

Hey, kids, that’s what the press is for. They’re the eyes, ears, nose and for sure mouth of the world. It’s their job to learn. And tell.

ROLL over Colin Farrell. Ireland’s next hottie is James McAvoy from “The Last King of Scotland.” He’s out in August as the lover to Anne Hathaway’s Jane Austen in “Becoming Jane” via Harvey Weinsteinless Miramax. Lined up afterward is playing an assassin opposite Angelina Jolie . . . Sunday CNN spotlighted our swamped VA, which isn’t equipped for its influx since in the old days the wounded died on the battlefield, but today’s science keeps them alive and facing decades of brain injuries. I did precisely that story last week . . . A tale’s maybe coming down about a married anchor who may get unmarried because there’s a lover around . . . A tale’s maybe not coming down about an anchor moving elsewhere due to his small drug problem.

WHAT they’re saying: Last Thursday, a fan in the rain to Mario Cantone: “So how are you?” Answered Cantone: “Wet.” . . . Nathan Lane when I asked about he and Matthew Broderick not reprising “The Producers” for its last Broadway go-round: “Never do it again. Wouldn’t do it again. Can’t do it again.” . . . Sarah Jessica Parker on what’s she do with all her gorgeous brand-new hardly worn designer originals? “Keep them. Wear them. I’m too cheap to get rid of them.” . . . Kelly Ripa on what gets her up in the morning for “Live”: “Not an alarm clock. The kids. Even when I’m not on TV they wake me 6 a.m.”

ROCK ‘n’ roller Slash of the group Vel vet Revolver (our absolute favorites, right?) is around flashing a blinged-out silver Pirate watch complete with Swarovski crystals and skull and crossbones design. Whether it actually keeps time, this I don’t know . . . At “Curtains,” at intermission inside the theater, Alec Baldwin on his cellphone . . . Hollywood Madam Heidi Fleiss on did people launder her money: “They had to. You realize where it’s been?”

SELLING on eBay: A lock of Marilyn Monroe’s hair framed with the candid actual photo taken of her the same night the lock was cut. Same night she sang “Happy Birthday” to JFK at the Garden. She’s in the back seat of a vehicle. Photo has Marilyn’s lip print on the reverse. The shot and lock belonged to Bergdorf’s late celeb hairdresser Robert Freeman Champion, who coifed her that night and previously auctioned other snippets of her hair.

READER Richard Koenigsberg noted two Southern ladies, tourists, on the subway. The uptown C train going to Columbus Circle. One asked a group of polite boys in school shirts that said “REGIS,” “Where you going?” He answered, “To Regis.” She says, “Me, too.” The boy asks, “You? What will you do there?” She replies, “Well, see the show. You know, ‘Regis and Kelly.’ ”